Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1998 10:13:34 -0600
From: Robyn Herrington
Subject: Sub: HALLOWEEN: The Haunting of Calamity Creek
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Halloween contest: FICTION, Word count 3,500
Two entries per person
Send to ME rmherrin@ucalgary.ca as ascii or plain text
Critiques to ME rmherrin@ucalgary.ca
Dates: October 1st - 15th for submissions
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The Haunting of Calamity Creek
"Don't look back Edna. It ain't permitted."
"But, Ernestine, I don't know the first thing about being a ghost."
The two souls stood arm and arm. With their curly permed ethereal
heads upturned, the new arrivals slowly turned full circle where they stood.
"Ernestine, why did you have to hurry me, I wasn't even wearing my
good underware. And now look at us, half way between Cheyenne and the
Great Beyond, and me with patched up underware."
"Edna, the Almighty don't give a durn about your drawers, now pay
attention Edna, Lookie there!"
The two recently departed sisters were standing in a huge outdoor
amphitheater beneath a lush forest of ancient trees.The towering
giants were so tall, their crowns disappeared into a luminescent bank of
churning clouds. But there was something odd about those clouds.
Edna was the one who first noticed it.
"Ernestine, is it my imagination or do them clouds look like see
through people a way up there flying around like a bunch a heathens?
"Watch your tone, Edna. We ain't there yet, and ...Oh dear, Oh my
stars..."
The duo instantly found themselves up among the tree tops surrounded
by transparent people who whooshed by them at alarming speeds. All the
apparitions had hideous looks on their faces. Some of them didn't
even have faces. Others were missing an eye, or a nose. The sisters
looked at each other, each of their faces wearing fear itself.
"Oh, dear, Ernestine, there's been some mistake. This just isn't
right, Ernestine. I mean I could never..."
Edna's voice trailed off as two wild eyed specters closed in on the
frightened spirits of Edna and Ernestine Chalmers, formerly known
as the Chalmers sisters of Calamity Creek.
"Stand back you louts," squeaked Ernestine, her voice high pitched
like a squeaking gate hinge, her arms pushing out as if she were shooing
roosters off her front porch. "Back with ya now, git!"
The horrifying ghouls looked surprised, but vanished instantly.
Another bevy of monstrous creatures closed in on the pair. These were even
more hideous than the first two. Their faces wore tortured grins, their
eyes were black bottomless holes. This time it was Edna who acted. She
merely extended her arm toward the desolate souls. They too vanished
in a sudden snap of ethereal fire.
Edna turned toward her sister. Ernestine was trying on grotesque
faces as one tries on a hat. She pulled and pushed, pinched, stretched her
countenance until she was unrecognizable.
"What are you doing, Ernestine?" Edna whispered, "Oh Lord, you always
were full of the devil! Quit this nonsense, we've got to figure this
out."
"What's to figure out? Edna, we're obviously expected to haunt
people. Or more than that, attach ourselves to them, suck them dry of energy.
Face it, sis, this is who we are."
"It's who *you* are Ernestine." Edna again extended her arm. She felt
a momentary sadness, as her sister disappeared in a cloud of black dust.
Edna turned toward the light. As she drifted nearer its impelling
warmth, she felt a strange sensation between her shoulders. The
instant she moved into the Light, a pair of perfect white wings appeared on
the slightly bent back of Edna Chalmers.
Below in the Chalmers family house, a young couple was busy making the
old house their home; painting the front bedroom upstairs, and dusting
off a pair of old cradles they had found in the attic.
Edna sat rocking, invisible as the wind, on the old porch, and
listened once more to the lovely trickling of Calamity Creek. The young wife
gave birth to twin girls. The angel smiled. She wrapped her great
wings about the two little souls, cradled them in soft down, and introduced
herself.
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Robyn Herrington, Editor rmherrin@ucalgary.ca
New Currents in Teaching and Learning
InfoServe www.ucalgary.ca/~rmherrin
University of Calgary Phone: 220-2561
Leadership lifts a person's vision to higher sites, raises a
person's performace to higher standards and builds a personality
beyond its normal limitations -- Peter Drucker
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